Greenbook vs. Redbook

It’s all too easy to confuse the Treasury Department’s recently issued greenbook outlining the Obama administration’s tax policies with the venerable women’s magazine, so here are a few examples of the ways they differ.

On marriage and family

Greenbook: “Expand the Earned Income Tax Credit (EITC): Provide marriage penalty relief and enhanced benefits for larger families.”

Redbook: “What You Can Learn from Your Parents’ Marriage(s)”

On disaster recovery

Greenbook: “A five-year carryback applies to: (1) farming losses (regardless of whether the loss was incurred in a Presidentially declared disaster area); (2) certain losses related to Hurricane Katrina, Gulf Opportunity Zone, and Midwestern Disaster Area; and (3) qualified disaster losses.”

Redbook: “Isaac Mizrahi Makeovers: 6 Fashion Disasters Fixed!”

On relationships

Greenbook: “Extending marriage penalty relief improves fairness and removes financial impediments to marriage for some low-income households.”

Redbook: “12 Easy Moves to Make Your Sex Life Hotter”

On health care reform

Greenbook: “The Administration believes that limiting the benefits from certain itemized deductions to not more than 28 percent of the taxpayer’s outlays would provide some of the resources necessary to fund important reforms to the medical care and medical insurance systems.”

Redbook: “Diet Myths That Make You Fat”

On air travel financing

Greenbook: “The Federal Aviation Administration’s (FAA’s) financing system should be more cost based. The current excise tax system, to the extent based on taxes on the amount paid for air transportation, does not provide a direct relationship between the taxes paid by users and the air traffic control services provided by the FAA.”

Redbook: “The Vacation That Doesn’t Cost a Cent: How to get away from it all without spending a cent.”

On self-improvement

Greenbook: “The AOTC makes college more affordable for millions of middle-income families and for the first time makes college tax incentives partially refundable. If college is not made more affordable, our nation runs the risk of losing a whole generation of potential and productivity.”

Redbook: “Are You Secretly in a Rut? Ever feel like you’re so focused on taking care of everyone that you don’t know who’s running the show anymore?”

On encouraging reading

Greenbook: “An assessable penalty would be established for a failure to comply with a requirement of electronic (or other machine-readable) format for a return that is filed.”

Redbook: “The Hottest Beach Reads of the Season”

On dealing with the economy

Greenbook: “A temporary extension of the NOL carryback period provides taxpayers in all sectors of the economy that experience such losses with the ability to obtain refunds of income taxes paid in prior years.”

Redbook: “Swimsuits for Your Body and Budget”